Inquiry into the Researches of Professor Margaret Kovera - Essay Example

Inquiry into the Researches Margaret Kovera, Phd Inquiry into the Researches Margaret Kovera, Phd I. Background of the Professor Margaret Kovera, Phd is a Forensic Psychology Professor of John Jay College, City University of New York. She took her Bachelor’s Degree in Northwestern University majoring in Psychology and graduated with Departmental Honors in the class of 1988. She took her Phd at the University of Minnesota. Her Major Program was Social Psychology and her Supporting Program was Statistics. She belongs to class 1994. She is a Past-President, American Psychology-Law Society and a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, the American Psychological Association, and the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPSSI). II. Program of Research Margaret Kovera’s program of research can be grouped into four categories which are jury selection, legal decisions about scientific evidence, blind line-up administration and sexual harrassment; a. Legal Decisions about Scientific Evidence Margaret Kovera study about scientifc evidence showed that regular people may not be able to discern flaw in a scientifice research (Nisbett, 1993 qtd. In Kovera and Levett pg. 364). This research coupled with a Supreme Court decision that judges must evaluate the reliability of a scientific evidence presented in Court (Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, 1993 cited in Kovera, nd) led Margaret Kovera to pursue a research about the judge’s capability to effectively evaluate scientific evidences. Kovera’s study was done on the backdrop that the court itself has procedural safeguards against unreliable expert evidence that will help jurors discern the validity of scientific evidences presented in court. These are “cross-examination, presentation of contrary evidence (including opposing expert testimony) and judicial instruction on the burden of proof” (Kovera and Levett, 2008 pg. 364). But since jurors are having difficulty discerning between flawed or valid scientific evidence, Kovera’s study provides the opportunity to determine how effective these safeguard mechanisms in court. Her research was an eye opener. While previous research showed that expert’s testimony (along with the scientific evidence/s presented) can influence the juror’s decision-making, Kovera’s research showed that this is not conclusive because it can only happen in certain circumstances. One of the reasons given for the inconclusiveness of expert/scientific evidences influence to juror’s decision was “that the defense expert testimony had no effect on verdict and the opposing expert caused skepticism independent of the defense expert’s testimony” (pg. 371). This was supported further by another study where jurors who have no control on the scientific evidences presented “would rely on the message cues of ecological validity and general acceptance when evaluating the evidence because they lacked the ability and motivation to systematically scrutinize the expert’s study (McAuliff and Kovera, 2008). This may be disturbing but the research validated that “the presence or absence of a control group did not affect the evidence quality ratings of low-NC jurors, F(1, 146) = 0.54, ns, partial h2 = .00 (control present, M = 4.26; control absent,M = 4.43) Ecological validity and general acceptance did not interact with NC as predicted” (399) indicating the conclusiveness of the study that when jurors are unsure, they get their cues from others. b. Jury Selection One of the more prominent research of Margaret Jay was on the study on psychological processes influence and when these characteristics influence verdicts. She also did a research on how actors that included demography, personality or attitudinal characteristics that could predict the juror’s results (http://web.jjay.cuny.edu). It indicated that jurors are vulnerable to prejudices that in one of her study, it showed how children’s testimony who are showing emotion on court proceeding can influence a jury’s decision (Kovera, 2012). c. Blind Lineup Administration One of Kovera’s study challenged the long held notion about blind line up administration that a lineup administrator’s knowledge about the suspect’s identity may influence the administration of the lineup itself. She contends that little research has been done to validate on how a lineup administrator’s knowledge of the suspect can influence the accuracy of suspect identification. This is important because analysis of the cases that involved erroneous convictions was due to “using evidence based on mistaken eyewitness identification” (Kovera, 2009 pg. 70). She called on for more laboratory studies to diagnose whether the identification of the suspect under double and single-blind administration and other procedures that could moderate “the effects of administrator knowledge on witness reliability” (70). Her most recent research suggests however that double blind lineup administration may be effective when other factors that decreases the reliability of witness identification are not present that include the lineup administrator and witness knowledge (Greathouse & Kovera, 2008). d. Sexual Harrassment In this study, Kovera researched how do jurors evaluate the claims of sexual harrassment and how they quantify the remunerative awards to the victims. In the study, it was revealed that organization of which both the parties involved belongs is a factor in the jurors extent of awarding or meting punitive penalties. It was found that organizational behaviors influence jurors decision of punitive awards whereby they are inclined to punish the plaintiff more when the organization had enforced sexual harrassment policy because the plaintiff had surffered less under this condition (Cass and Kovera, 2010 pg. 303). Kovera’s study indicate that jurors sometimes award damages that are in accordance to legal propriety and sometimes veer away from what is prescribed by law. III. Interest in Research My interest in Margaret Kovera’s research stems from the fact that it was able to identify the vulnerability of our judicial system. Just when we thought that the system is almost infallible with the jurors having the utmost capacity to discern scientific evidences, the study of Kovera provided an interesting insight that jurors also have shortcomings in discerning the valid scientific study from a flawed research. This insight interests me because it is very helpful on identifying the flaw in juror’s evaluation of evidences and thus, can become a major step in improving our judicial system. Her study was also able to know how certain prejudices, biases, initial knowledge and even sheer administration of the case can influence the court’s proceedings. This is particularly true in her study about the jury selection entitled “Do jurors get what they expect? Traditional versus alternative forms of childrens testimony” whereby Kovera demonstrated in the experiment that violated children who testifies in court that “ who do not appear nervous, tearful, or fidgety or who appear confident, maintain eye contact, and speak fluently may be at risk for violating jurors’ expectancies no matter what form of testimony they provide” (Kovera, 2012 pg. 44). On the other hand children who showed extreme emotion and vulnerability during court proceedings influence jurors decision indicating that jurors can be persuaded by their preconceived notion of children as being vulnerable thus, judging in favor of the child. I find this interesting because Kovera was able to zero in how emotion could persuade a jury which again, could prove vulnerability to our judicial system and an opportunity to improve it. The blind lineup administration of Kovera’s study interested me because majority of the errors in handling out convictions resulted from using evidences based on eyewitness identification of a suspect. I became interested in this research because Kovera and Greathouse were able to identify an administrative solution to minimize errors in identifying suspect during a lineup. The study of Kovera about sexual harassment also proved to be insightful on how Jurors evaluate the claims of the victims. This interests me because while the law prescribes certain damages to sexual harassment, the result of Kovera’s study indicated that “jurors sometimes award damages in a legally appropriate manner and sometimes do not” (Kovera, 2010 pg. 320). It is interesting that organizational behavior is a factor in determining compensatory damages which we did not consider before to have a bearing on sexual harassment cases. The research made me understand that jurors also veer away from the law’s prescription on how to punish sexual harassment cases depending on circumstances. IV. How Joining her Lab is a Valuable Educational Experience Joining Margaret Kovera’s lab is a valuable educational experience because it will enlighten me about the shortcomings and problems of our judicial system. Through this awareness of what besets our judicial system will provide me a rare opportunity to know how it can be addressed and improve. As a student still learning the ropes of the law, psychology and other attendant disciplines, it will open my eyes that the judicial system of which we religiously subscribe to are not after all infallible. Jurors are prone to biases and are even having difficulty in evaluating what is valid scientific evidence from the one that is flawed just like a lay person. The educational experience will teach me to be critical and not just accept what already exists or what is taught. It will teach me to evaluate and to analyze. The main point of this educational experience in joining Kovera’s lab is not to pigeon-hole our judicial system and to expose the vulnerability of our jurors, but rather, to have an insight that would enable us to address the problems and shortcomings we have identified by her studies and have a better judicial system in the near future. References Cass, Stacie A. Levett, Lora M. Kovera, Margaret Bull (2010). The effects of harassment severity and organizational behavior on damage awards in a hostile work environment sexual harassment case; Behavioral Sciences & the Law, 28(3):303-321. Greathouse, Sarah M.; Kovera, Margaret Bull (2009). Instruction bias and lineup presentation moderate the effects of administrator knowledge on eyewitness identification; Law and Human Behavior, 33(1): 70-82. Kovera, Margaret (nd). Personal page. Retrieved from http://web.jjay.cuny.edu McAuliff, Bradley D. Kovera, Margaret Bull (2008).  Juror need for cognition and sensitivity to methodological flaws in expert evidence; Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 38(2):385-408. Levett, Lora M. Kovera, Margaret Bull (2008). The effectiveness of opposing expert witnesses for educating jurors about unreliable expert evidence; Law and Human Behavior, 32(4):363-374. McAuliff, Bradley D. Kovera, Margaret Bull (2012). Do jurors get what they expect? Traditional versus alternative forms of childrens testimony; Psychology, Crime & Law, 18(1):27-47. Read More